Snark Sharks

More and more recently, I've become aware of the generation gap between mine and those older than me. It seems to be a bit easier to see the differences between me and those younger, but I find the differences between me and those older more striking¹. One thing I find interesting is when differences are pointed out, it usually comes across as criticism. Not necessarily destructive criticism, but criticism nonetheless.

If you were not able to see Conan O'Brien's farewell speech on “The Tonight Show,” take a moment to watch it now, specifically his remarks at the 3:40 mark. I bring this up for a reason. I am a pretty cynical person despite an optimistic and idealist side² that is often fighting to burst through. My Twitter page bio openly uses the word “snarky” to describe myself. One of my favorite shows is “InfoMania,” a show described by a magazine as “'The Daily Show's' smartass younger brother³.” I was visiting my parents one time and watching “InfoMania” and my father watched some of it. After a few minutes, he turned to me and asked, “Don't you ever get tired of being snarky?”

I think my response at the time was along the lines of “no.” I've since thought about it more, and my answer is this: What else do you expect?

For the first time in human history, we have been commodified and marketed to from birth. We exist to consume and spend in the corporate world's eyes. We were raised not on values, but on products, food, and items. When you're constantly being sold something for your entire life, you learn not to trust. We look at the 60s and 70s, and we don't want to violently revolt. We saw what that brought, and we don't want to go there. Besides, when you're constantly being marketed to, you are going to buy things⁴. It's unavoidable. We start making a ruckus, and we might lose some of those nifty gadgets. Who wants that?

Make no mistake: Some (many) people completely buy into this. They are caught at a young age, they like the life, they don't think it's worth it to fight, etc. Others don't accept what is trying to be foisted upon us, but the deck is stacked in their favor. We can't trust the government to help⁵, we see corporations doing whatever they want, we see many good things being sacrificed to the corporate cause (colleges, good domestic jobs, etc.). We get taken advantage of.

What can we do? Not much. There aren't enough of us, really, to change things. We do what we can, but it feels like throwing rice against a brick wall. We know how it's going to turn out⁶. So we turn to cynicism. We turn to cutting sarcasm. It's less an offensive tool than a defense mechanism. It's a way to stay sane. We choose to laugh instead of getting angry. Would getting angry help the cause? Perhaps, but again, we don't want to repeat the ugly events of the past.

In our own way, snark is gallows humor. Remember this when I make cynical riffs on Obama.

So why are we snarky? Frankly, it's a product of the world we were placed into. In other words, you did this to us. Conan doesn't like cynicism? Few people do. I know I don't enjoy it, but it's a trusted ally in a world sorely lacking them. But Conan has had success and riches beyond his wildest dreams. He lives in a fantasy world. We live in the real world, and we see the ugliness of it. He doesn't. It's easy to not be cynical when you have so little to be cynical about⁷.

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1 Then again, how important can the younger crowd yet be?

2 My cynical side might point out it wouldn't exist if not for the idealist, optimistic side.

3 I liken it more as a cross between “Daily,” “The Soup,” and “Tosh.0.”

4 Or you're going to live in a van.

5 Both parties- BOTH- are so obviously on the take it's sickening.

6 Yes, I may have read 1984 one too many times.

7 He could have been cynical about losing his show, perhaps, but he walked into a huge buyout as a result. Not much to quibble with.